Train That Derailed Was Going 72 Mph

Investigators Confirm Amtrak's Silver Meteor Was Traveling At Twice The Speed Limit When It Crashed In Palatka.

January 11, 1992|By Craig Quintana of The Sentinel Staff

DELAND — Federal investigators confirmed Friday that Amtrak's Silver Meteor was going twice the speed limit when it derailed in a Palatka neighborhood last month.

The engine's data recorder showed the train was traveling 72.1 mph when it bolted a 30 mph curve about half a mile north of the station.

It appears speed caused the derailment, said Alan Pollock, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating.

''The 'why it was speeding' is going to take a little while longer,'' he said.

The train's brakes have been found to be in proper working order. It had just come off a stretch of track with a 79 mph limit and should have been slowing as it approached the Palatka stop.

More than 50 passengers on the New York-to-Tampa train were injured, but none seriously, in the Dec. 17 accident. Two houses on Washington Street were destroyed and several others slightly damaged.

Damage to the train was set at $1.2 million. Railroad officials are still receiving reimbursement claims.

Engineer Conrad Peterson Jr. and assistant engineer Robert Moore were suspended without pay pending the results of the federal and Amtrak investigations. Moore was driving at the time of the derailment.

Routine drug and alcohol tests showed that Peterson had taken prescription medicine containing codeine and probably shouldn't have reported to work, Amtrak officials have said. But the drug was not believed to have played a part in the accident.

''If the mechanical functions checked out, I don't know where else to look but human error,'' said Ross Capon, executive director of the National Association of Railroad Passengers, a consumer advocacy group.